Sunday, March 7, 2010

Zombie voters, or double registrants, estimated at three to five million people may be the least of the problems in the May 10 elections if computations of the Pwersa ng Masang Pilipino (PMP) on the electoral process on the voting day itself prove true as the estimate only puts around 8.3 million of the 50 million registered voters would be able to cast their votes.

PMP senatorial candidate and former Negros Occidental Rep. Apolinario “Jun” Lozada said it would take 4.8 days of voting to be able to accommodate all the registered voters for the May 10 polls given an average of seven minutes per voter needed to complete the process from thumb printing, shading of the ballot, and feeding the ballot into the counting machines.

He said the wholesale disenfranchisement of voters is likely after the decision of the Commission on Elections (Comelec) to cluster five precincts into one counting machine.

“We are really worried. This would be worse than massive cheating,” Lozada told reporters covering the PMP campaign sortie.... MORE

The basis for the granting of special powers to President Arroyo to address a supposed power crisis in Mindanao may not exist at all as electric cooperatives on the island said the shortage may be aritificial.

The Association of Mindanao Rural Electric Power Cooperative (AMRECO) had called on the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) and the Joint Congressional Power Commission to conduct separate investigations into the National Grid Corp. of the Philippines (NGCP) on suspicion that the power crisis in Mindanao is being induced to justify a move to increase power rates.

AMRECO also questioned the state firm National Power Corp. (Napocor)’s plan to further reduce its power allocation to only about 50 percent or less..... MORE

Malacañang yesterday lauded the move taken by the United States government in granting the Philippine government’s request for the extradition of former police Senior Supt. Michael Ray Aquino to answer for his alleged involvement in the decade-old murders of publicist Salvador “Bubby” Dacer and his driver Emmanuel Corbito.

Deputy presidential spokesman Ricardo Saludo told a news briefing aired over Radyo ng Bayan that they welcomed this development which could hopefully take the Dacer and Cobito families’ quest for justice to another level through the assistance of the Department of Justice (DoJ).

“We have long been pushing justice to be served to the murdered Bubby Dacer and his driver, Corbito, so his (Aquino’s) imminent return (to the country) from America — hopefully the third witness to be extradited — is a major boost upon our quest for justice,” Saludo said in Filipino... MORE

What most politicians fear most, which is to lose their wind in the homestretch while seeing at the corner of their eyes, the one they dismissed long ago as an also ran bringing the rear fast, is happening to both Liberal Party (LP) bet Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino and Nacionalista Party (NP) candidate Manuel Villar Jr.

In the latest Pulse Asia survey former President Joseph Estrada was shown making a dash based on the presidential preference three months into the elections gaining six percentage points putting him within striking distance of Aquino and Villar who both suffered lower ratings from the previous survey in January, if one goes by what the surveys claim.

Estrada’s gain came after the Commission on Elections (Comelec) and the Supreme Court (SC) cleared all legal obstacles on Estrada’s run last January, said one Estrada supporter.... MORE